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Post by Hoosier X on Mar 9, 2024 13:00:08 GMT -5
Over the last couple of days, I read the long story in World’s Finest #250. Superman, Batman, Green Arrow, Black Canary, Earth-2 Wonder Woman. So they go to the satellite. They’re going to use the transporter to go to Earth-2. But Hawkman tells them that Superman recently brought Professor Potter to the satellite to look at the transporter (BECAUSE REASONS) and he messed it up. So Superman has forbidden anyone from using the transporter until it’s fixed. That was in Superman Family #186-187 and if you have not read it you really should because its awesome and gave us this incredible Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez cover. The first chapter has Curt Swan and Murphy Anderson doing a terrific Joe Shuster imitation. The story has Superman straight-up kill the bad guy. No hesitation, no recriminations, just "It's the only way" and boom! (I am also not real impressed with Superman’s judgment in letting Professor Potter look at the transporter.) Not disputed. Although I wonder if Conway linked the Superman Family story to some other previous story. He was connecting pretty much every story he wrote back then. I have that issue. I read it about six months ago, but I had just got a big batch of Superman Family comics and I was skimming them at one point, so I don’t really remember it. I think those comics are still in my nightstand, so I can just pull it out and read it without even going to the boxes.
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Confessor
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Post by Confessor on Mar 9, 2024 22:35:38 GMT -5
I should have read this much sooner, I am absolutely loving this collection of the early Manning era Star Wars newspaper run. The art is gorgeous and really suits Star Wars, and much as I have great nostalgia for its counterpart monthly Marvel series, this feels like a little "truer" Star Wars to me perhaps? Though it does likewise sort of carve its own path as we are in between the first two movies at this point, and I enjoy the storytelling in both. Definitely need to pick up the later material with Al Williamson as well. I quite like the Russ Manning era of the SW newspaper strips too, but they weren't printed over here in the UK at the time, so I don't have any rose-tinted attachment to them like I do with the Marvel series. I first encountered the Manning stuff in the '90s via Dark Horse's Classic Star Wars: The Early Years comics. Unlike you though, I find the Manning stuff to be hard going and not terribly Star Wars-y, but the artwork has its charm. I'm much more into the later Al Williamson newspaper strips, which we did get over here in the Sunday Express magazine in the early '80s. They feel truer to George Lucas's universe than the Manning stuff to me, plus Williamson is one of my Top 3 favourite comic artists ever, so I'm a bit biased. If you haven't already, you should check out thwhtguardian 's review thread of these SW newspaper comics, here. And if you're into the old '70s and '80s Marvel SW comics, you might enjoy my review thread of that series here.
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Confessor
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Post by Confessor on Mar 9, 2024 23:30:51 GMT -5
I recently picked up issues #17 and #18 of Doctor Strange from 1976, which are Steve Englehart's final issues on the series... These were both enjoyable comics, in which Strange and Clea travel back through time to see Francis Bacon (author of the utopian novel New Atlantis, which foreshadows the concept of America) and Benjamin Franklin (one of the Founding Fathers of the United States) in order to see the origins of the U.S. The whole issue is very much tied in with the then-current 1976 Bicentennial celebrations which were going on at the time. However, during Strange and Clea's time-travelling history lesson, it turns out that dark forces are at work (so, what else is new?!) and the magician Stygyro, who is the Sorcerer Supreme of the 17th Century, makes an appearance and tries to stop the formation of the U.S. for...reasons. Something that is very odd though, is that Clea ends up having sex with an elderly Benjamin Franklin for no adequately explored reason. This is a real head-scratcher, WTF moment. I know that Englehart was doing a lot of LSD at this point, but Clea and Franklin gettin' it on, while Strange battles Stygyro at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean for the very future of America, just comes out of nowhere and is probably one of the most bizarre things I've ever seen in a Bronze Age comic. All in all though, these are two really enjoyable issues. Like the best of Englehart's run, these comics are bat-sh*t crazy, philosophically thought-provoking, and very readable. There's also some really nice Gene Colan and Tom Palmer artwork in these issues too. I suppose that investigating the origins of the U.S. is a bit of a weird subject for a Doctor Strange story, but it's also a refreshing change of pace for the comic.
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Post by berkley on Mar 10, 2024 0:29:01 GMT -5
I recently picked up issues #17 and #18 of Doctor Strange from 1976, which are Steve Englehart's final issues on the series... These were both enjoyable comics, in which Strange and Clea travel back through time to see Francis Bacon (author of the utopian novel New Atlantis, which foreshadows the concept of America) and Benjamin Franklin (one of the Founding Fathers of the United States) in order to see the origins of the U.S. The whole issue is very much tied in with the then-current 1976 Bicentennial celebrations which were going on at the time. However, during Strange and Clea's time-travelling history lesson, it turns out that dark forces are at work (so, what else is new?!) and the magician Stygyro, who is the Sorcerer Supreme of the 17th Century, makes an appearance and tries to stop the formation of the U.S. for...reasons. Something that is very odd though, is that Clea ends up having sex with an elderly Benjamin Franklin for no adequately explored reason. This is a real head-scratcher, WTF moment. I know that Englehart was doing a lot of LSD at this point, but Clea and Franklin gettin' it on, while Strange battles Stygyro at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean for the very future of America, just comes out of nowhere and is probably one of the most bizarre things I've ever seen in a Bronze Age comic. All in all though, these are two really enjoyable issues. Like the best of Englehart's run, these comics are bat-sh*t crazy, philosophically thought-provoking, and very readable. There's also some really nice Gene Colan and Tom Palmer artwork in these issues too. I suppose that investigating the origins of the U.S. is a bit of a weird subject for a Doctor Strange story, but it's also a refreshing change of pace for the comic.
I agree that the Benjamin Franklin episode feels very weird (and not in a cool way) but I don't think we can pass final judgement on it since the story was unfinished - barely started, I suspect, as I've always had the feeling this was meant to be a major, multi-issue storyline. Of course it's quite possible that Englehart would have simply moved on and never referred to it again, leaving it as a bizarre, unexplained episode that continued to stick out like a sore thumb, but he was really at the top of his game around this time, especially on this series, so I wouldn't be surprised if he had something in mind that made more sense than it appears to do as things stand.
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Post by Confessor on Mar 10, 2024 0:49:12 GMT -5
I recently picked up issues #17 and #18 of Doctor Strange from 1976, which are Steve Englehart's final issues on the series... These were both enjoyable comics, in which Strange and Clea travel back through time to see Francis Bacon (author of the utopian novel New Atlantis, which foreshadows the concept of America) and Benjamin Franklin (one of the Founding Fathers of the United States) in order to see the origins of the U.S. The whole issue is very much tied in with the then-current 1976 Bicentennial celebrations which were going on at the time. However, during Strange and Clea's time-travelling history lesson, it turns out that dark forces are at work (so, what else is new?!) and the magician Stygyro, who is the Sorcerer Supreme of the 17th Century, makes an appearance and tries to stop the formation of the U.S. for...reasons. Something that is very odd though, is that Clea ends up having sex with an elderly Benjamin Franklin for no adequately explored reason. This is a real head-scratcher, WTF moment. I know that Englehart was doing a lot of LSD at this point, but Clea and Franklin gettin' it on, while Strange battles Stygyro at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean for the very future of America, just comes out of nowhere and is probably one of the most bizarre things I've ever seen in a Bronze Age comic. All in all though, these are two really enjoyable issues. Like the best of Englehart's run, these comics are bat-sh*t crazy, philosophically thought-provoking, and very readable. There's also some really nice Gene Colan and Tom Palmer artwork in these issues too. I suppose that investigating the origins of the U.S. is a bit of a weird subject for a Doctor Strange story, but it's also a refreshing change of pace for the comic. I agree that the Benjamin Franklin episode feels very weird (and not in a cool way) but I don't think we can pass final judgement on it since the story was unfinished - barely started, I suspect, as I've always had the feeling this was meant to be a major, multi-issue storyline. Of course it's quite possible that Englehart would have simply moved on and never referred to it again, leaving it as a bizarre, unexplained episode that continued to stick out like a sore thumb, but he was really at the top of his game around this time, especially on this series, so I wouldn't be surprised if he had something in mind that made more sense than it appears to do as things stand.
Yes, I suspect you are right about this originally being intended to be an extended, multi-part storyline. It really does feel like that. It would've certainly been fascinating to see what Englehart had in mind for this Bicentennial storyline. Still, Clea and Ben Franklin making "the beast with two backs" is a really weird thing for him to throw in here.
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Post by thwhtguardian on Mar 10, 2024 8:42:20 GMT -5
I should have read this much sooner, I am absolutely loving this collection of the early Manning era Star Wars newspaper run. The art is gorgeous and really suits Star Wars, and much as I have great nostalgia for its counterpart monthly Marvel series, this feels like a little "truer" Star Wars to me perhaps? Though it does likewise sort of carve its own path as we are in between the first two movies at this point, and I enjoy the storytelling in both. Definitely need to pick up the later material with Al Williamson as well. I quite like the Russ Manning era of the SW newspaper strips too, but they weren't printed over here in the UK at the time, so I don't have any rose-tinted attachment to them like I do with the Marvel series. I first encountered the Manning stuff in the '90s via Dark Horse's Classic Star Wars: The Early Years comics. Unlike you though, I find the Manning stuff to be hard going and not terribly Star Wars-y, but the artwork has its charm. I'm much more into the later Al Williamson newspaper strips, which we did get over here in the Sunday Express magazine in the early '80s. They feel truer to George Lucas's universe than the Manning stuff to me, plus Williamson is one of my Top 3 favourite comic artists ever, so I'm a bit biased. If you haven't already, you should check out thwhtguardian 's review thread of these SW newspaper comics, here. And if you're into the old '70s and '80s Marvel SW comics, you might enjoy my review thread of that series here. That collection has much nicer trade dress than the edition I have...very tempting to rebuy.
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Post by Hoosier X on Mar 10, 2024 10:49:24 GMT -5
I finished Adventure Comics #403 this morning. It reprints a bunch of Legion stories from the early 1960s, a lot of nice John Forte art. It’s all the Lightning Lad stories, the one where he dies, the one where they think he’s resurrected but it’s actually his sister Lightning Lass dressed as a boy, and the one where Proty sacrifices himself to bring Lightning Lad back to life.
Pure, unadulterated, Silver Age comic-book crack!
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Post by Hoosier X on Mar 10, 2024 10:53:48 GMT -5
So that’s it for that big stack of 1970s DC comics I’ve been reading. That’s the last one!
(Except for the 1970s Action Comics I ordered, but they haven’t arrived yet. It’s 13 issues between #465 and #492.)
The only thing I have left that I haven’t yet finished is To Wake the Mangog. I read the origin of Galactus last night! I’m about 3/4 of the way through the volume and I should be finishing it over the next few days.
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Post by spoon on Mar 10, 2024 13:56:35 GMT -5
I re-read Uncanny X-Men #132-138. This is the rest of the Dark Phoenix Saga plus the aftermath/funeral issue "Elegy" (#138).
We begin with a short respite when Cyclops, against Xavier's orders, brings the X-Men to Angel's mountain home in New Mexico. Cyke is worried about the Hellfire Club somehow knowing non-public information about the X-Men. We get the famed butte scene where Jean holds back Scott's optic blast with her powers to see his whole face. As revealed by a thought balloon later in this issue and then in a flashback, this is where Jean finally reveals her "time slips" (really illusions) to Scott. Angel is a member of the Hellfire Club (but not its secret evil Inner Circle) due to inherit a membership, so he arranges invites for the X-Men to a format party at the Club's NYC mansion. Scott tells Jean (through his thoughts) that he likes her dress; I wonder if it's because of the big cutout in the front. Jean is running rignt into her black formal gown jinx. Anyway, we have Scott, Jean, Ororo, and Piotr at the party, while Logan and Kurt are sneaking in through the sewers while setting up Chekhov's Gun through some exposed wiring. Disaster unfolds for the X-Men as Jason Wyngarde takes full control of Jean, with the explicit Mastermind reveal to both the readers and Scott. Meanwhile, Inner Circle members capture all of the X-Men, except for Wolverine whom Harry Leland assumes is out of the picture after being dropped through several floors.
Wolverine has his famed star turn as he fights back alone in #133 while the rest of the X-Men are captive. We get a lot of Jean's illusory life created by Mastermind, plus Cyclops trying to rescue her via an astral plane sword duel with Mastermind. Scott is seemingly killed. But I guess the dying on the astral plane kills you in real world isn't an ironclad rule, because Scott gets up after a few seconds in #134 and it's the key to the X-Men's victory. The shock of seeing Scott "die" shocks Jean out of Mastermind's control, although she keeps it on the down-low at first. Scott and Jean telepathically arrange a comeback. Colossus nearly tears off Donald Pierce's arms off. Piotr also reacts to a remark from Pierce that doesn't reference mutation as an anti-mutant bigotry. I guess Claremont was trying to set up Pierce's bigotry (despite teaming with mutants) and forgot to make the dialogue clear. Wolverine serious wounds Leland. Jean leaves Mastermind a drooling mess, after discovering But the X-Men flee because the police are coming as part of the Club's plan to frame them. Wolvie doesn't give Cyke a hard time about the decision to flee, maybe reflecting the respect he gained for him during the Proteus arc. Beast, on Avengers monitor duty, flouts Avengers protocol by going to the aid of the X-Men without alerting Avengers.
The cliffhanger of #134 has Phoenix becoming Dark Phoenix - her costume now comes in red. I find the rampage of Dark Phoenix in #135-136 to be the least satisfying portion of the Dark Phoenix Saga. For one, Byrne's art is uncharacteristically weak in #136, perhaps because he had to make time for the double-sized #137. Jean is oddly thin in many panels, although I think that was probably a stylistic choice. The destruction of D'Bari is grim, but the scripting is much better executed than the art. There were aspects of Jean's visit her family that I liked, but the action sequences weren't as well executed as the battle with the Hellfire Club for example. Angel flies Xavier to New York, where he manages to defeat Dark Phoenix by putting psychic circuit breakers in place. It only works because the inwardly conflicted Jean was helping him against herself. In the end we get a telepathic marriage proposal from Scott to Jean which is accepted, so I guess that counts. But then they're all teleported to a Shi'Ar spacecraft.
What can I say about #137 that hasn't already been said? Byrne has talked about his secret ambition to try to work all the originals back in the roster. Of course, it has epic scale, inner conflict with the X-Men between their love for Jean and the horror at what she did, and Jean's final sacrifice. The story manages to work Angel and Beast into the action, with only poor Bobby missing out. While much better artistically than #136, I think #137 has a few odd-looking panels. In the last couple issues, the explanation for Phoenix did migrate a bit toward the retcon explanation of the Phoenix. We were previously told that Jean's love for Scott causing her to tap into something inside herself during the fateful space shuttle flight to access the full potential of her powers. The scripting now has suggestions of tapping into a cosmic force, and there are couple mentions of a destructive power in Shi'Ar legends.
In #138, Jean's funeral serves as a framing sequence for flashbacks of Scott telling the story of Jean and himself. This issue holds a special place for me. As a relatively new X-Men fan when the Classic X-Men reprint of this issue came out, this issue along with the Wolverine Saga mini were my main guideposts in learning about X-Men history and what back issues I wanted to track down. Claremont and Bryne do tweak past events a bit, but they do a great job weaving everything together and telling a compelling history. It also has a classic, often imitated cover of Cyclops departing. I'd like to figure out what all the old covers in the background are, because many are larger obscured by the foreground art. It's kind of funky that Nightcrawler hops out of a tree at the end of the funeral. Maybe a compromise to continue to forgo the image inducer while not revealing anything to mourners who don't know who the X-Men are. In Marvel Time news, Jean's tombstone reads 1956-1980. A previous issue noted that she isn't even 25 yet, and the tombstone would make her either 23 or 24.
Every new beginning comes from some other beginning end, so the last half page of #138 has Kitty arriving at the mansion. This pays off the end of #131 when it sounded like Kitty's parents had agreed to let her attend. No one is there to greet her. Shouldn't the X-Men have notified the unaccompanied minor they'd all be at a funeral? Kitty is wearing a t-shirt with a word on it in rhinestones. The beginning and end of the word are obscured by her jacket, but I read in an interview somewhere it supposed to say "bitch." It's kind of hilarious. I wonder if it's a liberal parenting style of if her parents' rough marriage means they're not really paying attention.
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Post by spoon on Mar 10, 2024 14:17:10 GMT -5
My re-read of Giant-Size X-Men #1 through Uncanny X-Men #138 in late 2023/early 2024 has now linked up my late 2021 re-read of Uncanny x-Men #139-167. That project was based around Cockrum's second run, but I included the end of Byrne and the beginning of Paul Smith as I thought those were cleaner breaks in the story arcs than the changes of pencilers. On this re-read, I'm reading from recently purchased Epic Collections rather than the floppies, so I plan to read the rest of this Epic, which concludes the Byrne run and has a couple extras.
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Post by Batflunkie on Mar 10, 2024 20:35:34 GMT -5
Elfquest (Epic Edition) #1-#6 So earlier this morning I watched a video on Wendy & Richard Pini and Elfquest and it got me interested enough to actually try the series (I've known about it for years, mainly through Harbinger #13 where Faith is reading it). I got sucked into it pretty fast, even more so than even I was expecting It's a really well told series that doesn't come too (for lack of a better term) girly (and this is coming from a guy who got seriously invested in a lot of girly stuff during his youth like Winx Club, Magical Do-Re-Mi, Mew Mew Power and countless others). Think I might have to buy the entirety of the Dark Horse releases so I can binge read all of it
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Post by Calidore on Mar 10, 2024 20:54:36 GMT -5
Elfquest (Epic Edition) #1-#6 So earlier this morning I watched a video on Wendy & Richard Pini and Elfquest and it got me interested enough to actually try the series (I've known about it for years, mainly through Harbinger #13 where Faith is reading it). I got sucked into it pretty fast, even more so than even I was expecting It's a really well told series that doesn't come too (for lack of a better term) girly (and this is coming from a guy who got seriously invested in a lot of girly stuff during his youth like Winx Club, Magical Do-Re-Mi, Mew Mew Power and countless others). Think I might have to buy the entirety of the Dark Horse releases so I can binge read all of it The original 20-issue Elfquest series is excellent. I still haven't read the sequels, but I did get the lot in a Humble Bundle a while back. Someday...
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Confessor
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Post by Confessor on Mar 11, 2024 0:09:01 GMT -5
I quite like the Russ Manning era of the SW newspaper strips too, but they weren't printed over here in the UK at the time, so I don't have any rose-tinted attachment to them like I do with the Marvel series. I first encountered the Manning stuff in the '90s via Dark Horse's Classic Star Wars: The Early Years comics. Unlike you though, I find the Manning stuff to be hard going and not terribly Star Wars-y, but the artwork has its charm. I'm much more into the later Al Williamson newspaper strips, which we did get over here in the Sunday Express magazine in the early '80s. They feel truer to George Lucas's universe than the Manning stuff to me, plus Williamson is one of my Top 3 favourite comic artists ever, so I'm a bit biased. If you haven't already, you should check out thwhtguardian 's review thread of these SW newspaper comics, here. And if you're into the old '70s and '80s Marvel SW comics, you might enjoy my review thread of that series here. That collection has much nicer trade dress than the edition I have...very tempting to rebuy. I have all three volumes of these SW newspaper strip reprints. They are part of the IDW Library of American Comics collection and are beautifully presented on fantastic paper stock. Unfortunately, I believe the three SW collections are out of print now and, if other IDW newspaper strip collections are anything to go by, they will be pretty pricey on the secondhand market.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 11, 2024 2:43:04 GMT -5
That collection has much nicer trade dress than the edition I have...very tempting to rebuy. I have all three volumes of these SW newspaper strip reprints. They are part of the IDW Library of American Comics collection and are beautifully presented on fantastic paper stock. Unfortunately, I believe the three SW collections are out of print now and, if other IDW newspaper strip collections are anything to go by, they will be pretty pricey on the secondhand market. They are, I just won the second volume off of eBay last night and got I think a decent deal for what it normally seems to go for, but still rather pricey. Should have gotten the last 2 volumes when they were in print (got the first one new at the time), evidently I just forgot to follow through for some reason. Oh well, it's worth it for Williamson and Star Wars.
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Post by Hoosier X on Mar 11, 2024 9:21:21 GMT -5
I finished To Wake the Mangog, the Thor Epic Collection that reprints Thor #154 to #174. It starts with the first Mangog story arc (which is among the greatest Thor stories ever) and … it’s not so great by the time you get to #174.
Kirby only did five more issues after #174.
So I’ve read everything! For the first time in months, I don’t have a stack of comics I haven’t read.
That will change soon as I’m getting a bunch of 1970s issues of Action Comics. The first batch is supposed to arrive today.
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